I quit my job because “I think I am special” | Hacker News Reader

I quit my job because “I think I am special”

6 pointssansjoe8 comments

Defend yourself, prove this wrong. Nobody posts "I am staying put because I can learn and grow more here and I'm not greedy nor do I think I'm special, yet anyway."

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No employee in tech should ever think they're greedy for wanting to maximize their salary. We work in an industry where founders become literally the richest people in the world, where quarterly earnings are in the billions, and where earnings per employee are measured in the millions of dollars. There is nothing wrong with wanting a piece of that.

Get that money.

You forgot one subtle but very important detail.

Personally, I am not even mad about CEOs earning billions. What is however totally unacceptable is how corporations systematically try to lower pay to maximise profits. I am pretty sure you're American and that's why you haven't mentioned it. You probably think making 300 or 400k is normal. But it very much is not. Amazon, Google, Microsoft, open offices in India to hire cheap labour. How many Indians would you say earn above 100k USD would you say? I can tell you none or not many who are in non-management positions. An engineer @ 400k in California may very well earn 40k in India doing the same job.

"But India is cheaper" sure. That's true. But what's your disposable income in San Francisco and New Delhi in those scenarios? I can guarantee you that your disposable income is at least one magnitude higher in SF than ND. Like, rent is expensive, yes. But nobody pays that much so that salary compensates. The real reason why they pay less in India is because they can. No competition. In USA you will never get good engineers if you pay a shitty salary, because engineering salaries are ultra inflated in any company anyway.

Special? No.

I am a commodity dev. I don't view myself as particular special. However, a starving man is more motivated to get food than one who has food, so I sell my commodity accordingly. That requires switching jobs regularly.

Yes, I am greedy. I switched over the money. So did my boss. So did his boss.

Society just doesn't let me say that publicly with my name attached.

I am not special. I am just a salesman of code making labour who wants to earn market rate.

If by "special" you mean "I have a special set of skills" and you want to put them to use at another place, than this is true most of the time.

do people quit their job because they think they're special? I think that's something you made up.

Outwardly, no. It does seem like that though. People switch positions and announce on LinkedIn that they joined Google to work on awesome projects when they previously worked for the government.

It is considered classless to mention the 3x salary increase during that.

I quit my last job because I was done learning what I could learn there, and I also tough I deserved more money. I got what I was after. I don’t think it has anything to do with being “special” though.

If no one is special in this case, then who is your boss and why are you his subordinate?

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